Eternal Darkness: Boredom of Chaos
by The Karlminion
Summary: The other Ancients are dead, and Mantorok is bored. So now he and the shade of Pious are going to amuse themselves... at the expense of yet another person's sanity. Selfinsert.
1. Driven Away from All I KNow

_What if Pious had been working towards Mantorok's designs the whole time? After all, Mantorok is supposed to be this all-powerful, all-knowing god, right? And he's also the Keeper and the Warden of the Ancients. What if he got tired of Keeping and Warding them?_

_So he decided to get rid of them. And towards that end, he called upon Pious to insinuate himself with the other Ancients, in three separate timelines. He brings in all these others and has Pious work against them, testing and plotting, while also removing any obstacles that might be troublesome. And in the end, only Alexandra Roivas and Mantorok the Corpse God remain._

_But what of the Tome of Eternal Darkness? What of that cryptic sentence Pious uttered before he was finally killed: "No… my death is just the beginning!" The beginning… of what? Mantorok's reign, of course; he's gotten rid of his other responsibilities, and now he has nothing to do. He could conquer the world… but that would be boring._

_No…he and Pious are going to have a little fun. Not with Alex or the Roivas line; they've earned a few hundred years' break. No, they've got their eyes on another young person. A young man, just out of high school, living with and taking care of his bedridden grandfather._

_Me._

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_**Eternal Darkness: Boredom of Chaos**_  
_**Prologue- Driven Away from All I Know  
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_Pious…_ "Yes, my Master." _You have done well. _"Thank you, Master. Deceiving the other Ancients into thinking I was against you, and for each of them in turn, was no easy task." _I know; I was watching. Now listen. The other Ancients are gone, dead, obliterated. I am without a purpose, as are you. You can choose to go back, to forget, to be human once again…_ "No, Master. I have served you for too long. Another life would be inconceivable." _Ah… I had hoped you would say that. So then, you would stand at my side once again? _"I will, although I cannot see how I can be of use to you when I am a shade." _Is that your concern?_

A rumble filled the cavern in which Pious stood and Mantorok festered. Purple energy gathered in the stale air and coalesced about Pious's glimmering shade. There was a flash, and Pious could be heard screaming.

When the light faded, there was a man standing there. A man in what appeared to be the armor of the centurions of ancient Rome. But it was black, and crusted with ancient, bloody rust. The man himself was gaunt, pale, thin to the point of being skeletal. But his body was ropy with muscle, and his eyes gleamed with otherworldly intelligence. In his hands was a staff made of bones; it crackled with inner power.

The man looked about him. "Am I… alive?" _Yes, my servant… you live. You live as much as Alex Roivas lives._ "Alex… Master, are we to torture her yet again? Hasn't she had enough? Indeed, hasn't that whole family had enough?" _Indeed they have. No, my plan does not involve any Roivas; they deserve rest, all of them._

_We will be going after another. And we will have no purpose, other then to amuse ourselves._ "Ah, I see. Freedom is already boring you, so you seek to alleviate it." _No… we are merely biding our time. And it may be a long time to bide, so why not find amusement?_ "Good point, Master. Who is to provide us with this amusement?" _Another American… His name is Nicholaus…_

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"Nick… Nicky, come here…" "Mmmph, not now…" "Nicky…"

In my bed, there is, of course, me. I am Nick Dickerson, fresh out of high school and with no place to go. The voice one would hear would be that of my sickly, bedridden, senile grandfather, whom I was caring for. Grandpa has diabetes, and he is stuck in bed because of a diabetic shock some months ago. He was in a care home for a while, but eventually my grandmother couldn't pay their bills (damn them and their bills). So he had to come home, and someone had to be there to take care of him. Relatives were looked over and consulted, and I was chosen to be displaced and brought over.

Not that I didn't like my new position. On the contrary, I love my grandparents to death, and would do anything for them. But Lord, once in a while, couldn't You let him sleep, or make him sleep, so that I could take a stab at getting over my new-found insomnia?

No go, though. My ward calls, and I must go. What does the clock say? 3:33 am. Damn, and I was having such a good dream, too. Oh well.

Up I stood. I grabbed my lucky sweats and slid them on, to ward off the chill of too early in an Oregonian summer morning. I was inside, but all the windows were open, because when the sun rises the heat is unbearable.

Down the hall with me. Grandpa says he's thirsty; I go to the kitchen and fetch him some orange juice. Back to his room, which smells bad. I hand it to him, and he sips at it for a few seconds. Then he spits out the straw and mumbles something about the man he was supposed to see. I tell him I've already spoken to the man, and I leave, to go back to my room.

But I hadn't taken two steps when I heard this ghastly moan. Shambling steps come towards me; in the darkness, I can discern a humped, skeletal form. Then a green light emanated from the thing's eye sockets, and I froze. Screams echoed through my head, and I couldn't move for two seconds. Two seconds in which the zombie closed in and swung its open, grasping hand at my head.

The blow knocked me aside, into the wall. The pain broke through the paralysis that had been gripping me, and I leaped toward the things. I swung at it with my two fists, connecting three times and knocking it down. It groaned and was still, then it shivered and stood back up. But I didn't notice; I was running for my room, where under my bed was a sword I had purchased at the Festival just two days past. The only real sword in the whole lot, it was.

It was a long, two-handed Turkish sword, a shamshir or a tulwar, I couldn't figure out which. Didn't matter then; I brought it out, whipped it from its scabbard, and ran back into the hall. The zombie was shambling into grandpa's room; I couldn't allow that. I ran forward and ran the thing through its head, into the doorway. Blood and decomposed brain matter splattered out, covering the door with its foetor and rot. The thing fell forward and flailed about on the carpet; I stabbed down and twisted, through its chest, impaling its diseased heart. I tried to pull it back out, but it stuck for an instant, caught on some bone; I had to shove down with my foot before it would come out.

Then someone screamed; it was my grandmother. In my haste to dispose with the immediate threat, I had forgotten that zombies usually traveled in hoards. I ran to her room, but I was too late; before my eyes, the green light of insanity drove her to a heart attack.

I lost my mind, then, but not to insanity; to rage. I swung my long sword back and forth, slicing the monstrous beings into bits. Whenever one fell down, I stabbed it through where its heart would be.

When all the fiends were done for, my eyes cleared. I looked down at the body of my grandmother, and I swore to myself that I would hunt down whoever had done this and make them pay.

I remembered my grandpa, and went back to his room. More zombies were there; again I was too late; again I hacked, slashed, and impaled until I was the only one left alive. This time, it was literal; I was the only one left in the house who could claim even a semblance of life.

I looked down at my sword; it was covered in clotted blood and decomposed matter. I went back to the kitchen, grabbed a rag, and wiped it down. Then I went out to the garage, got some oil, and cleaned it off properly. Then I figured that I ought to sharpen it, if more monsters were about.

Sharpening my blade took long enough that the sun was up before I thought I was done. So, despite the fact that my grandparents were now dead, killed by the deadlights of impossible things, I went back to bed. And slept till noon.


	2. Chapter 1

_As befits a first person account of events like these, the writing will be rather disjointed and haphazard. Just warning you now, Constant Reader._

_Oh, and this was a lot of fun to write._

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_**ED: Boredom of Chaos Cht: 1  
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When I awoke, I knew what I had to do.

I had to find out who, or what, had intruded into my life and killed my grandparents, discover why they did it, and avenge my grandparents' deaths. Simple, in theory.

But in practice, it appeared more difficult then climbing Everest. After all, whoever had the power to bring a video game to life would be a power to reckon with. They could be watching me right now, for all I knew.

"Well, go ahead and watch, dammit," I said aloud then. "But know that I'm going to find you, hunt you down, and… and… I don't know. But it'll be painful, I promise you that!" When I stopped to consider what I had just done, I was amused and slightly horrified; I was losing it.

No matter. First, I had to get out of here. A bloody sword and two dead bodies would not look right at all to anyone who walked up at the moment. It wouldn't matter that the bodies were unmarked; I would be the first suspect. And that would be detrimental to my sworn objective.

So I got dressed; jeans, a belt, a black shirt, my denim vest, and tennis shoes. Into my backpack went three bottles of chilled water, my MP3 player, all the jerky I could find, five clean handkerchiefs, and some apples. My pockets accepted the burden of my wallet, my sunglasses, a pocketknife, and my cell phone. I found my grandma's purse and my grandpa's billfold, and after some moments of internal debate, I took all the cash I could find in them, as well as some jewelry from the dresser, in case I ended up in a place where American dollars weren't recognized.

I took a thin strip of leather, threaded it through the scabbard of my sword, and slung it over my shoulders, tying it to the straps of my pack. I hung it upside down, letting the clasps hold the sword in place; when the time came, I could reach back, undo the clasps, and let the hilt fall into my hand.

I was ready, or so I thought. There was the matter of a gun, of course; if this little adventure of mine was going to be anything at all like that video game, then I sure as hell needed something besides my sword. Melee combat is fine and dandy, but swinging a sword around, especially a big one like mine, gets tiring; guns, on the other hand, last as long as the ammo holds out.

Anyway. I stood in the middle of the den, listening for the voice of sanity and reason to assert itself and begin persuading me out of this. After all, zombies only appear in video games and nightmares, right? You're dreaming, you've been playing that game far too much lately; when you wake up, you're going to toss it out, or at least put it well out of the way for a while, and play a few healthy, well-lit rounds of Smash.

Yeah, right. That doesn't explain the deadlights, now does it?

Silence. So much for the voice or reason, har-dee-har-har.

Inaction does nothing, I told myself. So what did I do?

I opened the front door and got sucked away; looking back, I realize that I should have associated that weird whooshing sound with something. Preferably something that would have alerted me to the fact that opening the front door was going to get me sucked away. It was obvious, was it not? That whooshing sound preceded the sucking up of all the people in that game, did it not?

It did, now shut up already.

There I was, standing at the end of this cathedral-like space. The floor was a wailing wall full of specters; statues lined the way, and I felt myself pulled onward. I turned to look at each statue in turn; I recognized every one of them, though in real life they were of much better quality and realism then in that game. Especially the statue of Ellia…

A creak interrupted my fantasies; there, cradled in what appeared to be a leathery hand, laid a mysterious book. It was bound in human skin and intricately decorated with shrunken bones. It beckoned and yearned to be possessed.

Should Nick claim the Tome of Eternal Darkness?

Well, no, not if he cared to preserve his mind the way it was.

But he was going to claim it anyway, no matter what was said.

And I did.

There went my mind. Say good-bye to your mind, Nick!

…what are you talking about? I wish you'd shut up already.

Anyway. There I was, holding the Tome of Eternal Darkness, a book that according to everything I had once held sacred shouldn't exist. But there it was, in my arms; there I was, in the door of a house that didn't belong to anyone really, not anymore. So I left; houses like that had always freaked me out. Especially when they got that way because the former owners were dead in their beds.

I locked the door, like a well-drilled grandson should. I took my pack off my back and set it down, thinking to put the Tome in it; the thing was heavy, after all. How on earth did those blokes from that game manage to carry around all that crap without a bag of some sort?

Ask no silly questions, I'll tell no silly lies.

Shut up already! Jesus H. Christ, no one asked you!

But then a weird thing happened. I put the Tome in the bag, picked it up… and the thing weighed nothing. Nothing at all. "Cool!" I said. "I'll put everything in there!" I said.

So I went back into the house (me having a key and all), got more chilled bottles of water, more clothing, and my copy of that game. Then I put everything but my sword into it; the sword I left where it had originally been.

I stood up and turned to go up the driveway, which was when that whooshing noise began again. I froze in mid step, looking about me… and a portal appeared before me, a yellow-magick portal.

I knew, from that game, that yellow meant neutral magick. It also meant electricity. So, I step into it and get taken somewhere that may or may not be safe, or I get zapped. Surely now, you'd rather not get zapped? Or taken anywhere? Seriously, it's all a dream, you'll wake up in a second or two and, and…

And?

Um…

Ha! I knew it! Now would you shut your trap already! Reason and logic went away when I started talking to myself like this! You go away too! Now!

Sorry about that, where was I? Oh yeah, the portal. Yellow-magick, neutral and all that. Possibility of death by lightning. Yeah, I remember now.

Now, care to guess what I did?


End file.
